


Smoke and Cocoa

by AshIsWriting



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Fluff, Gay Mike Wheeler, Gay Will Byers, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Mutual Pining, Past Eleven | Jane Hopper/Mike Wheeler, Post-Canon, Post-Season/Series 04, Post-Stranger Things 3, Short One Shot, Underage Smoking, Will Byers Has Powers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-03
Updated: 2020-10-03
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:21:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,910
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26785081
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AshIsWriting/pseuds/AshIsWriting
Summary: Will had a long day, and so did Mike, might as well enjoy the cold together as they reflect on the other's company.
Relationships: Will Byers & Mike Wheeler, Will Byers/Mike Wheeler
Comments: 2
Kudos: 77





	Smoke and Cocoa

Will's mother smoked, and so did his father, it was bound to happen that he would feel drawn to a cigarette eventually, especially being so anxious all the time. Standing on the porch of his new house, he sighed as the cold air of the night hit his face, blowing some hair off of his forehead. It was strange, or at least was strange for him, but after everything he went through, he didn't hate the cold. He was cold most of the time, even during summer his body heat appeared to be too low, and his hands never seemed to warm up, so he just embraced the weather. He tipped his head to the side and stared with a bored expression at the snow covering his front yard.

That day had been quite the noisy one for being the first with guests at the Byers's new house. He could still hear El's and Mike's fight as the name of some cheerleader came into the conversation. He could still hear his sister's whiney voice as she asked for explanations, and Mike's bitter tone as he excused that they were no longer dating and hadn't been for a long while.

Will had to intervene saying that he had a headache, and they decided to close up for the night, each putting on their pajamas to say goodbye to that tiring day.

Now, the party had already gone to sleep, some on the couch and others on the floor, but he couldn't fall asleep. He took out a single cigarette and hesitated before taking out his lighter, one that his coworker had gifted him.

Will had started to work for a few hours at a restaurant downtown. It wasn't the big dream job, but he wasn't old enough to get something better, and as a waiter, he managed to give a helping hand to the family's finances. Besides, the restaurant was nice and most of his co-workers treated him with kindness. 

But working was another layer of responsibility that Will had to face in the city, and it was another layer of stress that he didn't want but had no other option than to take. Besides, he wanted to work and help, he wanted to feel useful.

He placed a hand over the cigarette to avoid the breeze, and the fire lit it up after a few seconds. He slipped the lighter back into his pocket and breathed in the smoke with a shaky inhale.

Will winced when the peace of the porch was disturbed by the door being opened, and someone walked out, harshly exhaling at the cold weather of the outside. Will lowered the cigarette from his mouth and eyed the person who walked out.

"Couldn't sleep?" Will asked with a faint smile.

Mike stood on the entrance with his hair disheveled from laying down, and smiled sheepishly, letting out a short laugh. He walked up to him, suppressing a gasp when he noticed the cigarette.

"Since when-" He began.

"Not long after we came to the city, though the smell was attracting since I was younger." He admitted and Mike nodded.

They stayed in silence, staring at the night unsure about what to say. The taller teen's eyes were pulled towards Will who looked surprisingly calm, relaxed. "Aren't you cold?" Mike asked as he noticed how he was only wearing a long-sleeved shirt and a pair of thin checkered pants in the middle of November. 

Will smiled and shook his head. "No, no really." He sighed and looked at Mike. "What about you?"

The taller teen snickered, involuntarily wrapping himself with his arms. "A bit. It's pretty chilly! I mean, it's almost winter."

Will snorted. "We aren't even in December yet, dumbass."

"Yeah, but we are almost there." 

Both laughed and Mike felt a warmth in his chest: he had missed him so much! Talking to him was easier than talking to his other friends, though Mike knew that the thought wasn't very nice. One always has a favorite friend, and even though Dustin insisted Lucas was Mike's best friend, he knew that Lucas wasn't as easy to talk to as Will was.

The taller teen felt a sudden wave of tiredness as he stood on the porch, and cussed himself for the itchiness of his suddenly heavy eyelids. It had been a long day for him, unpacking, and all. And El was still too clingy with him, not to mention the odd fight they had earlier about this random cheerleader whose name he didn't even know.

He never really minded this behavior before, hell, he even praised it to some extent. But after the moving, and him suddenly having a lot of spear time to reflect on his feelings, he felt uncomfortable acting like that with her, mainly around people, like Will.

It felt like El was blocking the neon signal on Mike's chest that spelled: single, and ready to mingle. And the worst thing was that, deep down, she could notice how uncomfortable Mike felt.

He peered to the side and extended his hand, picking the cigarette from Will's hand carefully, and taking a breath out of it.

Will widened his eyes and opened his mouth forming a tiny O with his lips. Mike noticed it and smirked cockily. "What? Do I not look like the kind of guy who smokes?"

"No, you totally do." Will joked. "But it's kind of crazy to see you actually doing it." 

Mike chuckled. "My ass fell off when I saw you smoking. I should have guessed, though. With your parents and all the--"

Trauma, he wanted to say. And to be honest, he may have been projecting if he added this last part to his speech, so he simply bit his lip and expected for Will to fill in the blank. Luckily, he did. Both boys rarely ever had trouble when it came to communication, a single look would be like staring at an open book.

Perhaps because they could read each other so well, none of them were really afraid to show feelings with one another. 

Will was closed up, his feelings were locked up and thrown into the darkest side of his head for no one to access to it; except Mike, and even with him, there were exceptions. The first time Mike came to the conclusion that Will was one tough fella to pierce through feeling-wise was in the early stages of their friendship, where he would refuse to cry in front of him, even the day he fell onto a rocky path while playing on the playground and scratched his knee. Little innocent Mike wouldn't know the reason for this behavior and demeanors until he saw Lonnie shouting and shaking a 10-year-old Will who was trying hard not to tear up.

After that, it became easier for the taller boy to understand certain aspects of Will that seemed incomprehensible before. Perhaps it was for that reason that they understood each other so well, they respected one another-- most of the time.

Will hummed, ripping Mike off of his mind by placing his head on his shoulder, which was a bit less comfortable now that their heights weren't as different as they were some years before. "I'm sorry about El today, she just doesn't understand why you don't like her anymore, or when it happened." Will noticed Mike's expression. "I don't condone her." He explained, taking the cigarette back.

The taller teen shook his head lightly. "I just-- want to move on. We had a thing since I was twelve, and I think it's time to grow out of it." He sighed and looked at his hands. "Besides, she needs to think about herself without me in the picture, it wasn't healthy."

Will nodded, hiding a smile with the cigarette. "Are you planning on dating again?"

Mike looked down at him and saw his hazel gaze glued to the dark snow-covered empty streets, where the only light was the lantern on the opposite sidewalk. "Yeah, you could say that." He nodded, and Will looked up, locking both their eyes together.

When they were young, the first-year-of-middle-school kind of young, Mike used to love staring deep into Will's eyes and trying to pick apart every color and shade on them applying the excuse that he wanted Will to know what markers to use when drawing the party. 

He still loved looking at Will's eyes, because after you know those pair of orbs by heart, you start to find new shapes on them, new beautiful details that one wouldn't realize without knowing them perfectly. 

For Will, Mike's eyes seemed like those dark windshields on rich people's cars. They always seemed to be there to protect Mike's soul and heart from getting seen because he wasn't used to swallowing down feelings as strongly as, for example, Will was. But he could see through them because that's what time does, your eyes eventually get used to the darkness and you manage to see the full picture.

Looking at Mike's eyes was looking directly into his soul. But there were times where Will was too frustrated, where his brain was clouded by negative feelings, and he could see through him.

"That's what you are concerned about right now?" He had spatted the summer before.

Mike saw him, looking to make eye contact, trying to read Will and pleading for him to read his eyes back. "It's not the main concern, it's a side concern."

But Will was so angry and Mike was so ashamed, that the once open book of their eyes was no longer visible for none of them.

Not a single car was visible on the street as both boys stood still, staring at each other eyes with their mind focused on their own thoughts. Until Mike shivered violently, startling them both.

"You are cold." Will pouted.

"I'm-" He shivered once more and closed his eyes in annoyance, tittering teeth forcing him to stop any words coming out fo his mouth for a few seconds. "Yeah."

Will's blank face shifted into a grin and he stretched his arm to pat his back, putting out the cigarette on the snowy wood of the porch. "Get inside, I'll make us some hot cocoa." He offered.

Mike smiled as he saw a glimpse of Joyce reflected on him: the posture, the caring tone, and that willingness to stop whatever they are doing for someone else's well being. Even the cigarette resembled her. He nodded. "You are the best."

"I know." Will sniggered.

Mike turned on his feet and made his way towards the inside of the house. He shuddered softly and savored the feeling of his body reheating on the slight warmth of the place. Meanwhile, Will stood outside and glanced up at the small Christmas lights that already decorated the porch, even when they were still far from the holiday. 

El had insisted on decorating the house for their friend's visit, and because they didn't have much more than a few colorful lights that had been bought by Joyce during Will's disappearance and some other Christmas garlands and wreaths, they had to work with it and hang it all over the place turning the house into a Christmas tree.

He stretched his fingers slowly, feeling how the skin expanded on his hand, and for a brief moment one of the lights turned on, making Will's eyes soften. 

The rest of the lights turned on for a few seconds too when he closed his fist, so fast that blinking would have prevented you from seeing it. Will paused and ran a quick hand on his nose, cleaning the blood out of it. His eyes fell onto the back of his hand, smeared with the still-warm blood, and he decided that he would clean it by stroking the other palm over it repeatedly until it was no longer visible.

He straightened up and placed the already wet-with-snow cigarette in his pocket to finally enter the house. His whole body shook fiercely at the change of temperature from the outside to the inside.

"Did you see that?" Mike whispered from the kitchen, turning on the lights. 

"What?" Will walked up to the cabinet in the kitchen and took out two cups, one with a star wars logo, and another with the ghostbusters one.

The shorter teen gestured for Mike to get the cocoa, and he did with a short nod, though it took him a while to find it on the new kitchen.

"I thought I saw the lights on the porch lit up for a second." He commented as he moved his hands through the cabinet, and Will snorted. "What? It could be." Mike smiled nervously as he placed the cocoa on the counter.

"Yeah, it could." Will took the milk from the fridge, poured it on a cooking pot, and proceeded to turn on the fire of the stove with his lighter. "Maybe an electric malfunction?"

Mike shrugged, eyes fixed on the shorter boy's actions. "I don't know, man, maybe."

Will placed the milk on the stove and looked over at his friend. "Maybe it was El." 

He couldn't help but snort onto his hand when Mike winced and his face shifted into horror at the mere thought, though he calmed down after a quick look towards the living room where El was peacefully sleeping on the couch.

"Ha ha, asshole." Mike faked a laugh, and his words didn't match the affectionate expression occupying his face. "Very funny, are you sure you want to live from art and not stand up comedy?"

Will stuck his tongue out at Mike, and it felt like they were kids again like they weren't smoking just a few minutes ago, or talking about ex-girlfriends, or having jobs as a waiter and at Family Video, respectively. Like they didn't go through hell and back three years in a row.

The smell of cigarettes that once occupied the whole kitchen had been overtaken and slightly fused with the warm milk's sweet smell, and the new "fragrance" (at lack of a better word) didn't wait too long to make itself present on the living room, waking up the whole party. Dustin entered the kitchen first, still half asleep and with squinting eyes, and crossed his arms clumsily over his chest, mumbling something about not inviting him to drink some hot cocoa. The next to enter the room was Max, who was slightly more awake than Dustin, and she rose both eyebrows before making her way towards the cups and choosing one with the drawing of a wave to awkwardly place it on the table where Mike was trying to avoid bursting out in laughter at his friend's actions. Later followed Lucas and El, fully awake and ready to taste whatever it was that was creating that sweet smell.

Will looked over at Mike, giving him a look that held some sort of apologetic annoyance. Mike smiled and shrugged, accepting that the night was no longer exclusive for them.

In a short period, the kitchen filled with voices and conversations that Will was too tired to ask to turn the volume down of, or even take part in. The sleepiness that had been escaping him the whole night suddenly hit him, and he glanced at Mike who was slowly but surely falling asleep on his hand as he listened to a heated debate between Lucas and Max about whether it's better when the milk is warm or cold.

He wasn't sure about what took over on his body, but he stood up, placed his empty cup on the sink, and walked all the way to the other side of the table to pat Mike's shoulder. "I think I'll head to sleep, and take this guy here with me, too."

"Yeah, you better take him to the couch, or he will get a concussion from hitting his head against the table repeatedly." Lucas pointed out, causing Mike to let out a soft growl of protest that melted away when Will pulled him up.

The two waved at the party who stayed in the kitchen and kept the debate going, and headed towards the bunch of mattresses and pillows surrounding the couch. As soon as they were on a considerable distance from them, Mike comically flew towards the first matters that he came across with. Will let out a soft laugh before making his way to the couch, but his arm got captured by the taller teen and he was too tired to do anything against it. He gave up without even trying to put up a fight, sat by Mike, and slowly laid by his side, looking at him with heavy eyes. The other boy glanced at his friend and felt the need to make a joke, maybe say that he would regret not letting him go the next morning, turn the situation into something undoubtedly platonic, but instead, smiled tiredly and leaned his head to the front so it would be touching Will's chest.

"Good night, Will." He whispered, extending the length of each word in a drunk-like tone.

Will smiled, smiled at the touch, at the words, at the night. He looked down, finding a head full of curly black hair and a streak covering part of Mike's already closed eyes. "Good night." He let out, knowing well that the taller teen was already asleep, softly snoring against his chest.

**Author's Note:**

> Well, I didn't plan on posting this but I couldn't help it, I needed a fanfic about post-season 4 that wasn't extremely distressing but had pinning and Byler, so here we are. Besides, with season 4 starting the production I am yearning for some good ol mutual pinning.


End file.
